


WHAT A TWIST!

by Ghost0



Series: The Doom Patrol [5]
Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-09-23
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:13:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,685
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26621941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghost0/pseuds/Ghost0
Summary: Behold a startling revelation that has never been done with the Doom Patrol in their entire history! If anyone says otherwise, they are lying! But will it stop Cliff from helping out his friends?
Series: The Doom Patrol [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1920121
Kudos: 1





	WHAT A TWIST!

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Cliff demanded answers from the Director of the Bureau of Normalcy. 

“Niles was a part of the Bureau for years.” Director Morgan began to explain. “Mainly as a researcher, figuring out why certain individuals or phenomenon are the way they are. Making it easier for us to try and make sure we can wipe them out. But then more individuals began popping up, more strange events occurring around the world. Some of these individuals have been accepted by the public, like that alien who flies around Metropolis. But there were still plenty of those who needed to be taken care of that no one would miss.” He scratched his neck as he thought back. “That was when Niles suggested we form a group that can go out in the field and deal with the strange head on. Of course, he argued that it would be best to try and use the strange people to our advantage.”

“Does that mean that no one from this Doom Patrol knew what they were being used for? Based on Cliff’s silence and what I’m guessing is his shocked state that at least he didn’t know.” Cliff was silent, his face as expressionless ass always. Even though Flex directly mentioned him, he didn’t speak up.

“I can’t say for sure, but that has always been my assumption.” Director Morgan said. “While I admit there was some merit in the idea, I have always suspected that Niles had some ulterior motives of his own. You see, he had a wife and child that ended up passing on following an accident with a drunk driver. Maybe in his grief he tried to form his own kind of family. Taking whoever – or I guess in this case whatever – he could.”

“Cliff said that they are all dead now. Did you change your mind about them and…betray them?” Flex asked.

Director Morgan shook his head. “The thought has passed my mind, a few times late at night. But I had nothing to do with that. Niles took them on a mission against one of the more dangerous strange individuals. General Immortus I believe he was called, a lead of a small island nation. Word was that he has survived centuries, achieving some form of immortality. Going with them in the field, he and Niles had a battle on the island located near South America. It appeared that Immortus, in a last ditch effort to defeat them, activated a bomb that killed everyone in the immediate vicinity. We ended up getting the body of Niles, but most of the other bodies couldn’t be properly identified. But seeing as how they are no longer around, I say good riddance.” Morgan started to pull out some sort of experimented gun from his back. “Now, we have been trying to figure out a way to finish you for good Flex. Your creator, Mr. Grant Way, was ultimately just a human when we caught him. But we had to put him down because the ability to give life to fictional characters is too big of a threat. We theorized that this firearm, which uses a special kind of particles, would be immune to any efforts on your part to stop them from finally finishing- “

Cliff punched him so hard, the cracking of bones could be heard. Letting go of the gun, it dropped on the foot. Crushing it under his boot, Cliff leaned over Morgan and began to repeatedly punch him. Flex had to reach forward and pull him off the badly bleeding man.

“Cliff! He’s down!” Flex said, wrapping both of his arms around his body. “Please stop!”

“That fucker deserves to die!” Cliff yelled out in fury.

“That is up to a jury to decide, if they think he deserves the death penalty.” Flex pulled him backwards until they hit the door they walked through. “But I understand your anger! I do!”

“They…they died because Niles fucking Caulder…!” Cliff stopped struggling, letting Flex release him. Standing there, he took a few slow steps forward. “If it wasn’t for him…”

Flex reached out and put a hand on Cliff’s shoulder. He just stood there, letting the silence fill the room. Director Morgan remained motionless but still alive on the ground before them. After a few minutes, Cliff turned around.

“We should…still find whatever shit we can.” Cliff walked around, turning down a random aisle of cabinet files. Flex checked out a few, flexing and making a bunch of them fly out and levitate in front of him as he looked through as many as he could. After several minutes of searching, it turns out that basically everything down in the basement could be used to tear down the Bureau. But they only grabbed a few of what they could, including tentative plans to maybe go after some more well-known heroes.

“That should do it.” Cliff tucked them away into his jacket. “We should head upstairs and relieve the girls from babysitting duty. I wouldn’t imagine they really had to do much up there.” The two walked out, leaving Morgan on the ground, as they headed upstairs.

******

“Get them Helen!” The woman held a Thompson sub machine gun and fired everything she had as her coworkers cheered her on. Casey and Bella used a fallen over cubicle wall to try and block the bullets.

“Helen sure has that heat.” Bella commented, checking out the various handguns she picked up during their fight. “Well, I’m out. Do you think you can get a clear shot at her?” She turned to Casey, who was trying her best to get a look at Helen while not being hit.

“Not without getting shot.” She turned back around and hid behind the wall with Bella. She turned to look at her partner. “I wasn’t expecting to go out guns a blazing. Where are the others?!” Just as she said that, the elevator dinged and the two walked out. Cliff ended up stepping forward ahead of Flex, with bullets hitting him and ricocheting off of his robotic body, making small holes in his shirt. After she ran out of bullets, he held out his arms to show an exaggerated look of confusion.  
“What the shit lady?!” Cliff yelled out at her. 

“Damn it! Need to reload!” But before she could do that, the gun in her hands turned into a giant fish. Yelping, she dropped it onto the floor. Flex winked at Casey, who smiled and came out around the wall. Firing a blast, she knocked her backwards into the wall, knocking her out cold. Cliff and Flex helped the girls gain some ground and joined them in a brawl against the remaining agents. After they were done, they got back in the elevator and went down to the main floor. The guard looked up as they walked away, thought about saying something to the guy who only wore a speedo. But since they were leaving anyway, he decided to not bother. Walking across the street, they gathered again in front of the Starbucks.

“So…how did things go for you?” Bella turned around and looked at Flex and Cliff.

“Well, I learned that my team was assembled by the Bureau shits themselves because Niles worked for them. Using us to do their dirty work.”

“Ouch. That’s rough.” Bella said sympathetically.

“It is! But hey, at least we got these babies!” Cliff pulled out the papers in his jacket. There were a couple of bullet holes along the edges, but they seemed legible. “So, that’s a victory for us! Looks like you two had more than your fair share of fun though.”

“You could say that.” Casey nodded her head. “But now that we have what we need, we can make sure that these guys never hurt anyone again.” Just as she finished that, the building burst into fire as it exploded. They all jumped and turned around to look at the building, smoke rising into the air as the first started to consume everything inside.

“What the fuck was that?” Bella yelled.  
“First of all, don’t steal my thing.” Cliff said. “But also, I didn’t do anything! Flex, did you have some sort of muscle twitch by mistake?”

“No sir!” Flex said. “What-?”

“AT LONG LAST!” They all turned to see a man standing in the middle of the street, several feet away from them. He had on blue tights underneath some pink metal straps, gloves, boots, and helmet. And right around his pelvis was a giant cannon that was aimed right at the burning building. “For years, people have walked all over me, grinding me into the dirt simply because I wasn’t all man where it counted! But now I have perfected my technology and will show the world that no one can take down- “ A bunch of police officers took him down from behind, a couple of them using their sticks to beat him into submission as they tried to disable his weapon and put handcuffs on him. The gang just looked on in surprise and confusion.

“Well, that’s a freebie.” Bella finally spoke up. “So, is it still worth giving those to anyone?” She pointed to the papers Cliff was still holding. 

“Hold on.” Casey pulled out her phone and looked up the nearest news stations. Showing Flex the address, she asked “Can you send them there? Maybe put a rock on them so they wouldn’t get blown away?” Nodding, he flexed an arm muscle and the papers disappeared. “There, shouldn’t be long before they report on that. If they decide to I mean. This…does sort of take care of itself.” All of them nodding their heads, they let Casey call to Danny and have him teleport them back, leaving the burning building in the national capital.

******

Outside the cabaret, Cliff was under an out of use ambulance trying to fix it up a bit. Inside the cabaret, Casey and Flex sat down at a table, going over everything that had happened while Bella was behind the bar looking for drinks.

“Cliff can’t be taking this too well.” She said. “I mean, his team died and he just found out that the reason they were formed in the first place was to serve the bad guys. How did he react when he first found out?”

“Well, he attacked the Director. He was bleeding a fair bit, but when we left he was alive.” Flex replied. Also confirmed that Grant…that they got to him.” He crossed his arms and looked down at the table. Casey felt guilty for focusing so much on Cliff, reaching a hand out on the table and laying it face down.

“I’m sorry Flex.” Casey said. “If there is anything-“

“Alcohol!” Bella put a couple of bottles of whiskey and scotch on the table. “To celebrate but also to process.” Bella put her hands on her hips as she looked at the two of them. “Sorry, I don’t really hang out with a lot of people. I know this is all heavy stuff, just thought it might help somehow.”

Casey looked at one of the bottles, shrugging her shoulders. “Fuck it. Hand me a glass.” Bella grabbed a few, handing one to Casey. Pouring hers almost all the way to the brim, she easily drank half of it, coughing a bit afterwards. “Yep, that’s strong.” Flex politely shook his head, not looking for a drink at the moment. Bella got near Casey, putting a hand on the back of her chair as she sipped some of her drink.

“So, should one of us talk to him? I’m new to this whole team thing, so I’m not sure what protocol is.” Bella said.

“We have been a team for exactly one mission.” Casey responded. “Don’t exactly have a manual for these kinds of revelations.”

Flex stood up. “I’ll just check in on him. See if he needs a hand.” The girls let him go outside, standing at the sidewalk as he looked down at Cliff on his back, under the ambulance. He walked around to the front of the old vehicle, where Cliff had it propped up for easy access. “How’s it going Cliff?”  
“Almost got it!” Cliff called from beneath. Sliding out, he turned his head towards Flex. “Mind giving a flex to start the damn piece of shit?” He did so, the sound of an engine coming to life. “There we go!” Cliff stood up on his feet. “Took me a couple of hours, but the thing has life! No offense Danny, it doesn’t actually have life. Just a figure of speech.” Danny used a nearby window to show that he knows that it’s a figure of speech. Flex held his hands in front of him as he cleared his throat before speaking.

“You know; we are here if you need to air out some frustration or talk things through.”

Cliff slumped his shoulders a bit. “Look, I’m not really in the mood to talk about all the shit that I have going on right now.” Flex nodded in understanding. “But thanks for saying that. It’s just…even though I absolutely despise Niles now, there was still everyone else that didn’t know. They died serving the wrong people. So did I, but I’m not exactly dead. Not alive either, depending on your philosophical beliefs.”

“From that perspective, we have something in common.” Flex said. “I’m a comic book character that a young kid created. I shouldn’t be here at all.”

“I don’t want YOU to say that about yourself.” Cliff pointed to him. “I’ve known you all of, like, less than a day. But you genuinely want to help people and do good. That makes you more real and grounded than so many fucking people out just doing what they have to in order to get by. You are more real than me back before I got trapped in a tin can.” He turned around, lowering his hand and staring at the ground. He then picked it back up and look straight outward. “You know what I really want to do? I want to take this thing right here and just drive. I was a shitty guy years ago, but the one thing I knew I did well at was drive and enjoy the open road.”

It was then that the girls came outside, each one still holding their own glasses as they walked around to join the other two. “Hey Cliff, I know you can’t drink, but if you want I’m sure Danny could create something that can take a few punches if you want to expel so anger. Granted I don’t know much about the power of a sentient street, but I think that shouldn’t be too difficult.” Bella said.

“I think you should go Cliff.” Flex said, getting his attention. “Go out and try and find out who you are now. Not who you used to be.” The girls looked in confusion, obvious that they are missing something and simply not just drunk. It would be a few more drinks until they get to that stage.

“I can’t do that. I had to leave my other team because…well, death. Choosing to leave, I don’t know.” But Cliff saw a banner appear above the street in front of him. With big letters, Danny spoke to him.

“We’ll be fine Luv! Go out into the world!”

Cliff turned around and looked at the old ambulance. The girls, managing to piece together the gist of the scene, stood back. Cliff got on the sidewalk and got into the driver’s seat. Rolling down his windows, he looked out as Flex got on the sidewalk with the others. “I’ll make sure to send tacky postcards from every gas stations I come across.”

“Got a destination in mind?” Casey asked. 

“I never did get to see the Grand Canyon.” Cliff said. “Might take the long way there, see some of the sights.” Putting his seat belt on out of habit, and not for actual safety, he turned and looked at the others. They smiled and gave them his support. Looking out towards the open road, he slowly moved away from the sidewalk, speeding up as he started to leave Danny and the others. The sun up high in the sky, he went out into the unknown. Bella walked back inside and Casey started to follow. But she noticed that Flex was thinking about something. Turning back around, she stood next to him and just looked out across the street.

“I remember when Danny first contacted me.” She told him. “I was still in my own comic book and these words just appeared in space. Sitting in my spaceship, I thought it was a trick from a group of space mercs or an enemy planet. But then I appeared in that comic shop over there.” She pointed left, to the little store with a stand of comics out for display. “Still thinking it was some sort of trap, I destroyed the inside of the store, almost killed Brenda in the process. But then it really started to sink in and…I felt empty.” She sighed out loud, looking at the liquid she held in glass and swirled it around.

“What do I do now?” Flex asked. “The way I was born…or I guess created, I was so confident and sure about myself and the actions I took. But now knowing that it was always going to end up with me saving the day, I feel like I could never do any of that on my own.”

“Grant didn’t feel that way I bet.” Casey responded. “When he felt them start to get closer to him, he pulled you out for protection. Even though he created you, knew you were just something he created a long time ago, he believed that you could help him. And you did. You got all of us to come with you and to take down the people who were responsible.” She rubbed his back in comfort. “You’ll get your confidence back.” She walked away and headed back inside. Flex stayed on the sidewalk and looked up in the sky, deep in thought and trying to figure out what to do in the coming days.

******

A cat walked out of the alley, going up to Casey who stopped to pet it. “Hey there Lotion. How are you doing buddy?”

“You have a pet cat?” Bella asked. She joined Casey in going back to her old place, grabbing some stuff that she wanted to have. She decided to move out and live with her dad so to speak. It’s a little weird when your dad is a sentient street, but at least she doesn’t have to pay rent. 

“No. This little guy just hangs around my building. Every once in a while I leave a little something for him out by the alley.” She put him as he purred and closed his eyes as she petted his fur. “Last time I get to do this. Don’t forget about me too quickly, all right?” She stood up, letting the stray cat go back to the alley, searching for food.

Bella followed Casey into the building, up the stairs and down the hall. Opening the door, she went into her bedroom to grab a bag to put some stuff in. Bella closed the door and looked around for a bit. “You can tell that you don’t spend a whole lot of time here. Barely anything in here that could be considered decorative.”

“I worked a lot of hours.” Casey called out. Bella sat down on a high stool at the kitchen counter, grabbing an old newspaper and looked for some comics. The redhead paramedic walked back out and looked at her TV. “You think I should bring that with me?”

“Danny has TVs. At least in Cliff’s old room.” Casey laughed a little bit, making Bella look up.

“Shit, your right. Must have slipped my mind.” 

“If that’s the worst thing to happen to your head when your buzzed, then I think you have pretty good tolerance.” Bella put the paper down, crossing one leg over the other. “Got everything you need or do you need a few more minutes.” 

Casey walked around a bit, eventually getting over to Bella. “It just feels so weird. I feel like I’m moving forward yet backwards. You know?”

Bella nodded. “Kinda had the same feeling when I finally broke out. I knew what my immediate plan was, evade police and try and fight…” Bella covered her mouth as she laughed. “I’m RATcatcher, and Gotham has BATman. I think that’s kind of funny.” Casey giggled with Bella for a moment. But Bella got control of herself again. “Anyway, I had no idea what I wanted to do. I mean, I was totally ready to just live my life behind bars. Sure, I didn’t have a life sentence, but I was ready to stab some of those bitches. OK, communicating with rats isn’t flashy but I can still make them hurt you! But no, I’m agreeing with what you’re saying. Doesn’t feel completely natural.”

Casey nodded, looking down while Bella looked up at the redhead. Then suddenly, she grabbed the Latina’s face and planted a kiss on her lips. Pulling back, the redhead blushed hard but tried to keep it cool. “I think that’s n-natural.” She felt her heart beat a little faster. Bella gently grabbed Casey’s open jacket and pulled her back for another kiss. The two decided to spend one last night in Casey’s old apartment. While they stayed, Flex went around to meet other people living on Danny and got to know some of the other people. If he’s staying a while, might as well get to know them. Cliff kept on moving forward on the highway, listening to the radio and singing along with an appropriately named REO Speedwagon song. As all of this unfolded, there was a full moon overhead, shining brightly amid the dark sky.


End file.
